Come Home

I love this picture. It so perfectly represents the man that Major James Watson is - a tireless servant of God. He's quite possibly the most selfless man of Christ that I have ever known. Putting others first is second (perhaps first) nature for him.

Everyone has a favorite uncle. My mother has four brothers and so I'm blessed with a lot of great uncles. Uncle Jim is hands down my favorite. He never tires of telling me how special I am to him and how proud he is of me (I'm not saying he knows what he's talking about in this, but it sure doesn't hurt to hear that sort of thing).

Anyone in our family will tell you that Uncle Jim is a master dishwasher. At family gatherings he can eventually be found standing at the sink, carefully and lovingly washing the debris from the festivities that preceded. He takes great (but quiet) joy in this thankless task - never seeking praise or glory for this duty, often sleeking away when no one is looking and hoping to finish before anyone notices. Nothing gives him more joy than to serve others and as silly as it may sound, dishwashing for a party host meets that need perfectly.

It's a great reminder to me who so often forgets that service done in silence greatly pleases our Lord. As you can imagine, washing dishes just scratches the surface of a lifetime of passionate service as a Salvation Army officer, but funny enough it's the steady example that is most familiar to me from countless Christmas and Thanksgiving dinners together. It makes me smile to think about it.

I am deeply moved as I pause to consider the untimely passing of this beautiful man of God. No offense to active officers, but they just don't make 'em like they used to. Knowing and loving Uncle Jim for 31 years pushes this image from merely lovely up to divinely inspiring for me.

Uncle Jim.. we love you so much! You will be missed greatly, but we're so excited that you are at this very moment seeing your Savior, whom you served so well, face-to-face.

ET - Ezekiel Terrestrial?

This just in - according to a guy on the History channel, Ezekiel's vision of a "wheel in a wheel" may have been an alien encounter!!

Laughable, but UFO-fanatics find a sighting in just about any literature or history involving looking upward.

Have you ever wondered with such a vast universe, if God may have created any kind of life on another planet, out there somewhere, far far away? Scripture does not indicate this in any way, but would we really need to know about it? Certainly a God so great as to create such a vast and wonderful universe could manage it all - but did He?

I know I'm a sci-fi nerd of sorts, and I'm probably alone in finding this line of thinking interesting, but I wonder if there is anything in scripture that might negate this possibility?